"Lily The Fence" Goes To Prison

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 29, 4 February 1939, Page 9 (Supplement)

"Lily The Fence" Goes To Prison

IF you had seen plump, honestlooking, 59-year-old Lilian Baker walking with her dogs in Hyde Park each morning, you would not have connected that charming old lady with "Lily the > Fence," cunning receiver of stolen property, whom the police had sought' for eight years. Moat people regarded Mrs. Baker as a. woman of means, for alio lived in a beautifully-appointed flat at Maida Vale at £230 a year. It was only a privileged few who knew of tlio liouae at Paddington wliore she bought stolen goods, and the flats in various parts of London where stolen 1 property was hidden. ' For tlio next throe years, while "Lily" ' is serving the penal servitude sentence imposed 011 her at the Old Bailey for receiving, London's underworld will be , without one of its most valuable markets for crime proceeds. / But "Lily's" temporary absence from the business world will be a of S considerable satisfaction to the police, who regard her arrest as one of importance. As Detective-Sergeant Jamioson, of the Flying Squad, told the Old Bailey Judge: "She has teen associating with thieves for the past eight years to my knowledge, and has been strongly suspected of receiving stolen property--throughout that time.

"Sho is a curtniilg and plausible woman, dlflicult to trap." Lily's habit of running a number of "hide-outs" all over London bad made her difficult to trap. Though, she was regarded as London's chief woman receiver, it was diflieult to bring a charge against her and she made hundreds of pounds out of her bargains -with crooks and her investments in property. But in the end, it was a few pieces of stolen property hidden in her own flat that -put "the woman they couldn't catch" behind prison bars. Police discovered the goods, when they called with a search warrant. Thirty-year-old Reginald Mead, ticket-of-leave man, declared in Court that he had taken to Mrs. Baker property he had stolen from a house in Chelsea and that she had given him £22 10/ for it.. "Lily," who had turned pale when she had seen Mead enter the witness-box, stood with head 'bowed while giving evidence. She stated she was a dressmaker and had often bought and sold old clothes. Detective-Sergeant Jamieson revealed that Mrs. Baker, who lived apart from her husband, had four previous convictions. Bound over ih 1928 for false preteiices, she was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment in 1933 for receiving, fined £5 at Maidenhead in 1934 for aiding and. abetting in the 6ale of intoxicating liquor without a license, and fined in 1937 for keeping a disorderly house.

Passing sentence, the Common Serjeant, Mr. Cecil "YVliiteley, K.C., told Mrs. Baker, "This is the second time you have been convicted of receiving stolen property. The public must be protected. from receivers, and I am satisfied that you are known to thieves as a receiver." "Lily," murmuring, "Yes, yes," turned up the fur collar of her black coat and shuffled from the dock. Mrs. Baker's* sister, wlio owns a board-ing-house at Maida Yale, heard her sentenced. .She had been surprised t'6 learn .of her arrest. . "I think sho must have become a 'fence' for the thrill of the thing," she stated afterwards. "Sho had plenty of money. She always kept herself very much to herself, and 1 never inquired too much as to how she spent her days." Of two men tried with Mrs. Baker, Reginald Mead, who pleaded guilty to stealing property worth £400, was sentenced -to four years' penal servitude. Jack Marston, 28-year-old baker, found guilty of receiving, was given three years' penal servitude. Mead, who is married, had seven con--victions, including a sentence of three years' penal servitude in 193G for storebreaking. He was said to have given the police every assistance* and to have made a complete confession. . Marston, also married, and living in Goklliawk Road, Shepherd's Bush, had a number* of previous convictions; including three years' penal servitude for receiving in 1934. He wa6 first convicted when he wao aged seven, for stealing a loaf.